If you want a lighter, more portable camp-style shelter, we highly recommend checking out the REI Co-op Screen House Shelter. The Eureka Tagalong Shelter is also a decent option but is not fully enclosed. Likewise, the Pacific Breeze Easy Up is very portable but limited in size. While the previous version of this tent used beachy-feeling aqua and orange, the current version is a drab olive green more typical of other tents.
As an American manufacturer of pop-up tents, we’re committed to building structures that can survive in strong wind and inclement weather. That’s why we employ a team of engineers who design and battle-test our products to perfect. We looked for features like double-stitched seams, weather taping, steel, robust fabrics, and fewer moving parts. The Eureka Tagalong is lightweight with stellar components, so if you want to be a bit more mobile with your canopy, this is one of our favorites.
The massive screened walls keep insects where they belong — away from you. This shelter is also fully surrounded by a 10-inch-wide ground skirt, which goes the extra mile to keep creepy crawlers and flying annoyances at bay. The REI Co-op Screen House Shelter is easy to set up and pleasant to use, providing good protection from bugs, sun, and gentle rain showers. A high ceiling makes the tent feel brighter and more airy than other camping shelters with a similar footprint. It’s advertised as a 10×10 tent, but your canopy is actually 7.8’ x 7.8’, for about 61 square feet of space under the canopy. If canopy coverage is important to you, this is a very good reason to go with a straight-leg option.
Like the REI and L.L.Bean canopy shelters, this Clam tent has a generous fabric skirt at its base that is designed to keep determined insects—and pooling rainwater—out. If we were camping somewhere infested with mosquitoes or no-see-ums and could fit the Clam in our vehicle, we’d prefer it over any of our other picks. The shelter has a 10-by-10-foot footprint—the most common size for tents of this type—and a peak height of 7 feet. It will shelter a standard-size picnic table, but with little room to spare.
Below, we discuss the metrics we used to score each model and highlight impressive models in each performance area. Fully enclosed and ready to protect you from sun, wind, rain, AND bugs, the Clam Outdoors Quick-Set Escape is a perfect shelter for the campground. No assembly is required; this shelter is ready to go right out of the box and can be fully deployed in less than a minute. We admit there is a small learning curve to setting up the Escape, but once you’re locked in, popping this canopy into place is really fun and even somewhat addictive.
That said, if you don’t expect to use your tent in rugged environments, this is a solid option for a nice big canopy tent at a bargain price. During the winter and early spring of 2017, we added four more canopy tents to our testing lineup. In addition to the models from REI and L.L.Bean, which became our new top picks, we tested the Coleman 15 × 13 Instant Screenhouse and the Wenzel Sun Valley Screen House. L.L.Bean’s Woodlands Screen House is remarkably similar to our top pick, REI’s Screen House Shelter; the two canopies have an identical footprint and pole structure.
The Pacific Breeze Easy Up is a beach tent with a half-dome design and enough space to shade one or two adults. Its one-pull setup requires more muscle than anticipated, but overall, it is hassle-free and takes only seconds to erect. At 5.4 pounds, it’s the lightest canopy in our lineup, making it very portable. We like the built-in sidewall pockets, attached floor, and roll-away side drapes.
The add-on fly for our runner-up pick, the L.L.Bean Woodlands Screen House, offers four-walled protection, though it’s also more than twice as expensive. Fellow campers and sun-baked spectators consistently gravitated toward the REI shelter over the L.L.Bean. Though the two tents have the same footprint, the REI’s roof is 6 inches taller; we found that the higher ceiling made the REI shelter feel significantly roomier inside. With all that in mind, we found more than a dozen tents that met our criteria. Overall, we think the Ozark Trail canopy serves its intended purpose – a value brand 10×10 instant shelter that caters to price conscious consumers looking for an affordable shade option.
That’s why when you dive into online reviews, you see slant leg tents that have broken at different connection points, and customers complaining that it failed after only a few uses. Our second grading metric involves how fast and easy it is to set up and take down each shelter, but it also considers how simple and intuitive both processes are. While we recommend a minimum of two people to set up most shelters, the ease of this process ozark trail canopy can vary drastically depending on the design and quality of materials. While being timed, we set up and took down each product a minimum of 10 times. We also noted special features, like quick-release levers, that make setup easier. If your budget is tight, the Pacific Breeze Easy Up is an inexpensive beach canopy that provides the essentials for a quick, hassle-free setup but may not be built to endure many summers of use.
The thicker, darker netting also makes the whole structure shadier, even without the optional side panels. The Woodlands Screen House uses six lightweight aluminum poles, just like the Screen House Shelter. Like the REI model, the L.L.Bean tent uses polyester (ripstop, in this case), which is more resistant to UV damage and absorbs less moisture than nylon by weight. The Woodlands Screen House also has the advantage of eight guylines, whereas the Screen House Shelter includes none. In addition, this model has the same bug-deterring flap of fabric along the base as the REI tent, but while the REI’s flap is about 9 inches wide, the L.L.Bean’s flap is about 10.5 inches wide.